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Voters continue to send mixed signals about the $787-billion economic stimulus plan approved last year by Congress, even as spending for some portions of the plan begin to run out.

A new Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey finds that 36% of Likely U.S. Voters now think the stimulus helped the U.S. economy. Thirty-one percent (31%) believe it has hurt the economy, the lowest such finding to date, and 28% think it has had no impact. (To see survey question wording, click here.)

Fifty-eight percent (58%) of Democratic voters say the stimulus plan has helped the country. Fifty-six percent (56%) of Republicans believe it has hurt. Among voters not affiliated with either party, 34% say it has helped, 28% hurt and 26% had no impact.

Overall, the current results reflect a slightly higher level of support for the measure than was found last month but is in keeping with surveys back to August.

Prior to this survey, however, the number who think the stimulus has hurt the economy has ranged from 33% to 43%.

The survey of 1,000 Likely Voters nationwide was conducted on December 19-20, 2010 by Rasmussen Reports. The margin of sampling error is +/- 3 percentage points with a 95% level of confidence. Field work for all Rasmussen Reports surveys is conducted by Pulse Opinion Research, LLC. See methodology.

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